


Spring Cleaning

by Miso



Series: A War He Can't Forget [5]
Category: SCTV (Canada TV)
Genre: (kinda its not that strong but tbh its implied), M/M, PTSD, Regret, Self-Hatred, Vietnam War, whatever the opposite of nostalgia is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-05
Updated: 2017-04-05
Packaged: 2018-10-15 02:03:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10548180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miso/pseuds/Miso
Summary: It's hard to let go of the past sometimes.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I live for Floyd being sad. Please let my angry boy be vulnerable. :C Of course, I couldn't have filled this out this much on my own, so tons of kudos go to the lovely BlossomTime. She's been very patient with me with regard to my bombarding her with ideas and asking for advice and options on fleshing out said ideas and if you haven't read her stuff yet what in the hell are you doing GO DO IT. (There might be a few anachronisms as usual but I tried to remember this is 1981-82. :P I'm so bad at period fiction)

The middle of June was technically still spring, right? It wasn't the 21st yet. It was spring, and therefore, this was still spring cleaning. Earl tossed a few jackets that no longer fit him to the side as he dug through the spare bedroom's closet, where all of their clothes that didn't quite fit and things they didn't want but "might need" usually ended up. Floyd wasn't as bad about it as he was. He was good at getting rid of things. Usually.

Sneezing from the dust in his nose, Earl stepped back to clean his glasses off, but nearly tripped over a trunk he hadn't noticed before in the process. Wiping his glasses clean and replacing them, he took a closer look at it. The dark brown leather trunk was clearly old, maybe a hand-me-down, and he could only assume it was Floyd's. Maybe something from his parents, though that seemed unlikely. His relationship with his parents was tense at best. _It can't be mine, though, I would remember having a big-ass old trunk_ , Earl mused as he pulled it from the closet. Kneeling, he wiped some of the dust off of it and undid the brass lock on it, opening the lid slowly.

The contents almost took his breath away. They would've if they didn't break his heart. Inside was piles upon piles of military paraphernalia. He picked up and brushed off an old green hat, embellished with a single bronze star, then set it aside in favor of a green camouflage button-down shirt. "ROBERTSON" was stitched over one breast pocket, "U.S. ARMY" over the other. Floyd's old army stuff. "Why do you still have this...?" Earl asked out loud to no one. He set the shirt aside and continued digging, spurred by morbid curiosity and fascination. He knew he probably shouldn't be looking at this stuff, and Floyd wouldn't be particularly happy if he caught him going through it. Hell, he'd probably prefer it didn't exist at all, which only strengthened Earl's questions of why he was keeping it.

A pair of pants that matched the camo shirt, a button-down solid green jacket with a black pin engraved with 'ROBERTSON' and a series of decorations, and a pair of dress pants to match the jacket. Earl wasn't sure why he kept looking when he knew he really shouldn't, and didn't entirely want to. How was he gonna bring this up to Floyd? "Oh, honey, I was digging in the closet and I found a trunk full of stuff from the single most traumatic time in your life and I was wondering why the hell you're keeping it when I have to bring you down from a panic attack at least every other week?" Nah. He couldn't not mention it, though. He knew eventually he'd let it slip and it would be a lot easier to just get it out into the air right off the bat.

He picked up a black and white portrait of a young man, staring into the camera with intense and focused eyes. Earl sighed a little. He'd recognize those sharp cheekbones and that look anywhere. Floyd couldn't have been more than 20, maybe 21 when this picture was taken. He looked so... young. So fresh and ready to take on anything. A shotgun was over his shoulder, a gloved hand supporting the butt. His eyes were bright and the slightest hint of a smile played at his lips. God. What happened to this young man who'd faced the idea of war with a smile?

Earl froze as the bedroom door opened. "Earl? Doll, have you-" Floyd paused as he caught sight of Earl, still knelt in front of the trunk, gripping the photograph he'd found. An uncomfortable pause passed, followed by Floyd, in a hushed and nearly trembling voice, asking, "... Where did you find that?"

"I-it was in the closet," Earl responded, setting the picture down. "I didn't remember ever seeing it before and I wanted to know what was in it in case it was something important." He stood and turned to face his partner, taking his hand gently. "I didn't know..." Floyd pulled his hand away and brushed past him, packing the things back into the chest and sighing heavily.

"I was hoping these would never see the light of day again." He closed the lid, eyes watering, though Earl wasn't sure whether they were tears or just a reaction to the dust. "There's a reason it's in here, Earl. This is where things we don't want go."

"... Why are you keeping it if you don't want it?"

"I have to." Floyd sat on the bed and stared at the trunk. "... What kind of person would I be if I got rid of it?"

"What do you mean?" Earl sat on the floor in front of him, beside the chest. He wanted to open it again and see what he'd missed, but he couldn't. Not without Floyd saying he could. He didn't want to hurt him more than he already had.

"I... what happened was..." Floyd bit his lip and took a deep breath. "I just have to, alright?" Earl could tell Floyd was going into autopilot. He did that when he was stressed out. His eyes would glaze over and his voice would go monotone and he would just kind of shut down until he knew it was safe. It was almost like his body was present but his mind was a million miles away.

"Stay with me," Earl whispered, gripping Floyd's hand. "You're tuning out." He gave his hand a squeeze and watched the light return to his eyes. "There we are..." He leaned up and kissed Floyd's cheek gently. "Is it okay if I open it again...? Maybe there's some stuff you can get rid of."

"... Alright." Floyd winced a little as Earl opened the lid again. He tried not to react as Earl again removed the hat, his old fatigues, his dress uniform (well, what he was issued), and the picture of himself as a young man. He didn't know who that kid was anymore. Sure, he knew it was himself, but it felt like an entirely different person. That wasn't Floyd Robertson. Not the one he knew.

"Floyd? You're slipping again..." Earl gave Floyd's knee a nudge and startled him back into the present. He held a pair of shiny silver ovals on a ball chain. His dog tags. They were still pristine, but he supposed they would be. For all of the mud and shit, sometimes literal, that he had to crawl through in Vietnam, those godforsaken things were as shiny as ever. "What are these again?"

"Dog tags." Floyd's voice was quiet as he gently took them from Earl's hand. Glancing them over, he shuddered as memories came racing back to him. "... I got a lot of shit for listing Catholic as my religious preference."

"Did you?"

"Mm. Most of my unit was southern Baptist guys." Floyd felt a bitter chuckle pass his lips. "One of them made a joke about my priest back home touching kids and I decked him. Had to do 200 pushups in the rain." He crossed his legs. "But I knew my parents would resurrect me and then kill me again if I died and didn't have a Catholic funeral."

Earl was quiet as Floyd handed the necklace back to him. "... I'm sorry."

"What for? You weren't there."

"You just... went through a lot. And it isn't fair." Earl put the chain to the side and shrugged. "You didn't deserve that."

"I got off easy," Floyd said quietly. "I mean... besides the ones who died... I know guys with no legs. No arms. No limbs at all. Guys paralyzed from the neck down. Guys that lost their eyes or their ears and ended up disfigured." He closed his eyes to hold back tears. "Guys that came home and ended up hooked on heroin because of the opiates the medics used to stabilize them." Another bitter laugh and a half-real smile. "I just ended up an alcoholic with anger issues and an anxiety disorder. I'm lucky."

Earl's eyes were wide for a moment. He couldn't find the words at first, but after some fumbling he managed to whimper "You didn't get off lucky just because you didn't get maimed." He pulled himself up onto the bed and hugged Floyd tight. "You can't... you're still hurting. Just because you're in one piece, you... that doesn't mean you 'got off easy'." Earl noticed the picture from the corner of his eye, picked it up, and glanced briefly from the young man in the portrait to the flesh-and-blood Floyd in front of him.

For the first time, he saw it. He saw all of the agony in Floyd's eyes. He'd seen he was sad and hurting before, sure, but now, looking between the picture of him 20 years ago and now... it broke his heart all over again. He barely looked like the same person. Dark circles ringed his eyes, complimenting the bags beneath them. Lines had formed at the corners of his eyes, his mouth, across his forehead. He looked... old. Weary. Tired. Scared. Haunted. Earl pulled Floyd into another tight hug. "I'm so sorry..."

"It isn't your fault."

"... I got called by the draft board in '66."

"Did you?"

"... Yeah. A-and my dad got me out of it. He had connections." Earl sniffled a little. "... I wish I'd gone."

"Fuck NO!" Floyd pulled away from the embrace and gripped Earl's shoulders. "No, you don't! You don't wish that!"

"But-"

"NO BUTS!" Earl was kind of used to Floyd raising his voice- after all, he was infamous for his short fuse- but he wasn't used to him doing it while he was crying. That had happened once and it had been alarming then too. "Don't you DARE say that! Never!" Floyd sobbed and cradled Earl in his arms. Befuddled, Earl wasn't sure what to do outside of hug him back. "Y-you're too good for that," Floyd whispered, trembling and gripping him just shy of tight enough to cut off his air flow. "You're too precious. Too sweet." Another sob. "Don't ever think that... I-I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy. Let alone you..."

They remained like that for a while, until Floyd's sobbing faded. "... Can I finish the trunk now?" Earl asked softly, trying not to be insulting. "I mean... I feel like some of that stuff can probably go to that museum opening in Rosewood..."

Floyd wiped his eyes. "Y-yeah. Yeah... s-sorry about that. Just... don't ever say anything like that, okay? Y-you wouldn't have lasted a minute."

Earl nodded. "You got it." He slid off the bed and knelt in front of the chest again. He dug out a small tiger carved from ivory, a pair of well-worn boots, a beaded bracelet, and a lighter. "What's all this stuff?"

"The boots were part of the uniform." Floyd's voice was still a little gravelly, but he was understandable. "Everyone smoked, so I started too. The lighter was a gift."

"What about-"

"I got those on leave in Laos. A little kid gave me the bracelet. Just... ran up to me and put it in my hand and ran off. I kept it because it felt kinda like fate." Floyd half-smiled. "The tiger was some old lady. She told me it was a symbol of bravery and ferocity and if I kept it in my pocket while I fought I would come out of it without a scratch. I think she might have just been bullshitting me to get me to buy it."

"But you bought it."

"Yeah." Floyd's smile grew a little, seeming just a touch more genuine. "She was pretty convincing."

Earl smiled back. Maybe he was making a breakthrough. He could see the bottom of the trunk and kept looking through its contents. A knife ("I don't know why they let me keep that," Floyd said), a peace symbol medallion on a black cord (another gift), a journal that Earl didn't dare look through, another picture, this one slightly more torn, of a group of young men in what looked like some kind of campsite. One of them was clearly Floyd, but the other five Earl couldn't place.

When he turned to ask him about it, Floyd was quiet. It took Earl a moment to make the connection. The cave. The "accident." The war crime. "... Were they the ones that did it?"

Floyd nodded. Earl didn't push it any further. He set the picture aside and picked the final two pieces of paraphernalia from the trunk. Most of the bulk had been the old clothes, from the looks of things, because the last two items were a faded picture of another unidentified gentleman and a yellowed letter dated July of 1963. "... Who's this?"

"... His name was Jack."

"Okay... why do you just have a picture of him?"

"We... had a thing."

Earl fought back the rising jealousy. No, no, this was far before he knew Floyd. He wasn't his and his alone then. He'd had a life before him. "Oh." He hoped it didn't sound too cold. "What happened to him?"

Silence. "... Did he die?" More silence. "Get hurt?" Nothing. "Don't want to talk about it?" A nod. Finally, some feedback. "Alright." Earl turned his attention back to the picture and letter. Jack was handsome, that was certain. In the picture he reclined on a military-issue cot shirtless, dog tags resting between his defined pecs. The guy was ripped. The picture was in black and white, but his hair looked light, and he smiled up at the camera almost innocently. "Did you take this?"

"Yeah. One of the guys smuggled in a Polaroid camera. I traded him the dessert in my ration for it. He actually liked those things, believe it or not, so I almost felt like I stole the damn thing."

Wow. Cardboard chocolate cookies in exchange for an illicit camera. Nice trade. Earl moved on to the letter. The handwriting was sort of sloppy, but he could make it out for the most part. It was a lot of waxing poetic about nothing in particular, or romantic nonsense that probably would have killed a diabetic with how sugary sweet it was, but part of it stood out to him.

_I'll love you until my dying breath. You're the sweetest, smartest person I've ever met. When we get home I want to take you to Canada and we can be together the way we can't be here._

_Work on getting reassigned to Cambodia, okay? Then we can be together again. Kick some ass, baby._

_Love, Jack._

"He got reassigned?"

Floyd nodded. "And I never saw him again. I don't know what happened to him. Th-that was the last letter I ever got."

"I didn't know you stayed after the... incident."

"I felt like I had to." Floyd picked at his fingernails. "After... that... I felt like I had to stay. I had to make up for it. I had to be the best I could be. I stayed until '65."

"What happened then?"

"I had a breakdown. I don't remember much of it... I just... saw red and then the next thing I remember is being restrained to a bed being looked over by a doctor. My CO told me I just... snapped. Nothing really triggered it, I guess, I just... started waving a knife around screaming about how I was going to take it to my throat and get all of it over with."

Earl felt a hand unconsciously go to his throat and grip it. The image of 20-something Floyd, waving around a knife and threatening suicide... ouch. He cast a wary look at the knife in the pile, which Floyd evidently caught on to because he said "It wasn't that one."

"So... you got discharged because of your... problems."

"Yeah." Floyd sighed a little. "I went back to Denver and my dad could barely look at me. He told me I faked being a psycho to get out of doing what I signed up to do. I didn't tell him the only reason I left school and didn't wait to get drafted was that I wanted to make him proud of me. So I went back to school and got out of there as soon as I could."

"Jesus." Earl looked over at the pile of stuff. "... You know? We'll worry about getting rid of it later." He began packing all of it back into the trunk. "Why are you keeping it, though? You didn't really answer me earlier."

"... If I didn't keep it I'd be betraying all of the guys that died. And... I don't know, I feel like without it... what if I forget?"

"You won't. And you aren't." Earl stood up as he shut the lid and pushed the trunk back into the closet. "It's part of you now. You won't forget that... and you wouldn't be betraying them. You remember them. That's all you can really do." He closed the closet door and sat beside his partner. "They're gone, Floyd. It's in the past. You can't change it. You can just... learn from it. Do what you can and move on as well as you can."

"You're not supposed to be the smart one." Floyd leaned into Earl's side.

"I have my moments." Earl wrapped an arm around Floyd's shoulders and kissed the top of his head. "How about I order a pizza and we watch some TV, huh? Maybe someone's showing Blazing Saddles." That movie never failed to cheer Floyd up.

"If you want." Floyd wiped his misty eyes and smiled weakly at his lover. His hazel eyes looked exceptionally green when he'd been crying. "But no onion."

"Whatever you want." Earl kissed Floyd's cheek, ignoring the taste of salt on his skin. "I love you. I want you to be happy."

"... I love you, too." A pause. "... Thanks. F-for listening. For making me get all of that off my chest."

"What else are boyfriends for?" Earl asked, standing and offering Floyd his hand. Floyd took it gently and leaned against him as they walked down the stairs. Settling 6'5" of emotionally shaken reporter on the couch and turning on the TV, Earl pressed a kiss to Floyd's lips gently. "You're so much better than you give yourself credit for, Floyd. You really are."

Floyd found himself smiling again as Earl settled in beside him and grabbed the phone. The pizza order being rattled off and the television noise was just a faint buzz as Floyd contemplated what Earl had said. Vietnam was part of him. He was better than he thought he was. He couldn't change the past.

Maybe letting go was the only way to move forward.

He made a mental note to get in touch with the museum opening in Rosewood. Maybe they'd want some Vietnam-era relics.


End file.
